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So I have a '85 bird that is close to driving and the alternator would have been the last thing to get on and make sure is working properly...well once i got the alternator on and got the belt on today and ran the car, the amps inside the car were reading about 8 amps and so I haven't charged the donor battery i use for making sure cars run in a while so i right away knew that the alternator wasn't doing anything for its a new alt for one and I just put the battery on. I do what any sane person does and disconnect the battery as the car is running to see if the alternator truly was not working at all and indeed it was doing nothing so I am at a halt because everything else is done for driving but the alternator not working ha stopped me, does anyone know what could be the issue/cause this, would be greatly appreciated.
Welcome to TGO
Alternators are case grounded so you want to make sure those bolted connections are clean.
What's the condition of your negative cable from the battery to the engine head and your chassis ground?
With a fully charged battery what voltage are you getting at the power cable at the alternator?
It's possible to get a faulty regulator in a remanned alternator, get the alternator tested to confirm it's working
For reasons not at all clear to me, perhaps recent human interference but I have no way of knowing that for sure, the wire colors are reversed in the plug. The wire farther from the Big Red Post should be red, and the other should be white. (originally it was brown but for whyever the replacements all make it white) The one farther from the Big Red Post should go to the Big Red Post along with the one that goes to the battery, and the one closer to the Post should go to the dash light, choke relay, etc. Fortunately the electrons themselves are notoriously immodest about the colors of the wires they run in; in fact, I've even seen the blue electrons be perfectly happy to jump into the pink wires when necessary. But it helps to keep the colors straight for humans that are observing them.
Take that white wire off of the alt case and put it on the Big Red Post. It'll stand a much better chance of working even if it'll be looking kinda weird.
